Exactly two hours and twenty-four minutes after the polls closed, the Board of Education finally made public the election results. A total of 1,345 voters--14.12 percent of the potential voters--cast 861 votes to approve the budget and 485 votes to reject it. The BOE candidate with the highest number of votes was Lou Zapp, who garnered 858 votes, followed by incumbent Michael Zibella with 830 votes.
Of the write-in candidates, none of whom actually campaigned, Peter Meyer received 28 votes, John Friedman received 19, and Jon Spampinato received 5. One person in Claverack wrote in Diana Doto, who is already on the school board, although her name is now Diana Howard.
And so it goes.
COPYRIGHT 2026 CAROLE OSTERINK
I think it's safe to assume that there isn't going to be an answer coming from this new school board. All three candidates were by all measures quite bad but that of course didn't stop the electorate from voting in the worst of the three who made it abundantly clear that they have no clue how to fix anything. The one coming in third, the pastor, did at least once use the word "audit".
ReplyDeleteWe of course don't do this in the HCSD where the mandate of the day is to keep underperforming but protect the jobs. It is what matters: Screw education and definitely screw the kids - the only ones that can't vote.
I take some pleasure out of the fact that I wrote in both Peter Meyer and John Friedman. But it is ultimately a shallow victory.
I’m looking forward to when Hudson finally does a citywide revaluation and the people who were underpaying feel the brunt of the tax increases they voted for. City and school taxes have jumped massively since 2019 and the recipients of the “Welcome Stranger” assessments have been carrying the burden thus far. Even my own taxes have decreased in the past couple of years because of this practice. There will be a lot of folks priced out the day it comes. But nobody understands assessments and property taxes and the effects happen so incrementally that voters don’t know how to react. The system is working exactly how it was designed; a true diffusion of responsibility and the frog is slowly boiled. The ratchet only tightens in one direction. Eventually we’ll all get priced out. At least property owners will be able to sell and F off to a more boring place, but how do renters and younger families stand a chance?
ReplyDeleteRenters and younger families are already either priced out of or increasingly cost burdened in Hudson. That (apocryphal; they jump out) frog has been boiling for a while, it’s just taken some folks longer to notice.
DeleteI agree with you. I just think it will get accelerated when the smaller, and more senior, landlords get hit with huge revaluations. They’ll sell to people with more money who will not rent, but convert to weekend/single family homes,’thus reducing the rental stock further. The only place left to rent will be from larger groups; public (HHA), or Galvan/Bard/Fain.
DeleteI don’t know where the “ for the kids” crowd “ but “ tests scores don’t do anything but cause anxiety “ crowd think seniors and retirees can keep coming up with the extra $ and next year it will be the same BS, MS ( more of same) PHD ( piled higher and deeper.)
ReplyDeleteThank you to the folks who wrote in me, john, and jon. I note that the percentage of registered voters who voted -- 14+ -- is about equal to the percentage of HCSD students who read at grade level. In anticipation of the budget vote outcome, I suspended work on the story I was working on because my research was simply proving what the education intelligentsia have been saying for many years: every community gets the schools they deserve. My guess is that most of the 86% no-shows at the polls are part of the hypocritical class who don't have to worry about taxes or education and that at least 300 of the Yea voters are part of the "let them eat cake" crowd. Too cynical? It's worse than that: the consultant who was chosen to search for Superintendents for our poor little district, was not only part of the team who chose the last loser, but was once Superintendent of Albany, which has less success than Hudson in educating its kids. Stay tuned for that one -- in July sometime. (This board has obviously shown no rush about all these crises, perhaps to try to coverup the sweetheart steal ($200k) from the public to pay off the superintendent they fired to keep her mouth shut. I'd like to say stay tuned, but all I can say is that the kids remain wonderful and worthy of a good education despite the idiocy of their elders.
ReplyDeleteThe school election ran exactly as HCS predicted (Hudson's School Vote Captured), and worse.
ReplyDeleteEvery element of our diagnosis, the Hudson Hustle, on display:
~ Start with the math nobody wants to print.
HCSD employs around 500 staff (a 1:2.5 ratio with students). Add the 500 employes' spouses, parents, and adult children, and the in-house workforce alone swamps the 376-vote margin before a single outside parent / taxpayer walks in.
It is the civic equivalent of letting a public company's employees vote on their own audit, making it hard for shareholders and the public to vote, then asking why the audit always comes back clean.
Here is the rest of the hustle:
1. HCSD Municipal Capture
The Hudson Teachers' Association and the youth-services nonprofits campaigned in person yesterday, coordinated across all three voting districts. The taxpayer base had no one organising for it. Roughly 1,300 ballots out of 10,000 eligible. A 10-15% turnout. A May vote in a fire station is a turnout filter, and the filter selects for those who get paid. Move it to November and the result flips. But the Labor Union lobbies against this honorable change.
2. The Hudson Handicap / Deadweight Loss
Bad outcomes for the kids, rising taxes for the Working Middle Class, a lower human-capital stock for the area. HCSD ranks among the lowest-performing districts in NY State while per-pupil spending sits among the highest in New York. Pay more, get less.
3. The Hudson Hypocrisy
"It's about the kids" to give moral cover.
The FB commenters, the Farmers' Market parents, the recent graduates and boosters whose illogical and data-blind public arguments are themselves the most damning audit of the school's output.
Apparently only the Yes vote speaks for the community; any call for accountability or student success is anti-community, "hateful," "harmful," or "racist." It was never about the kids. It was about protecting jobs and benefits for the adults and their retired parents.
One thing even we did not predict: how badly the election was run by HCSD themselves.
- Residents shared that some poll workers and school officials reviewed ballots that are supposed to be anonymous.
- School employees handed out and collected absentee ballots while campaigning for one side, costumed as neutral poll workers.
- Several of our editors in Greenport, on their own initiative, wrote in a specific candidate as a test of ballot integrity. The votes did not make it into the final published results.
Probably just sloppy, and would of course not have changed the overall outcome. But wow.
- No 100 foot poll markers as their own law dicates, and clear electioneering within the zone and by the doors.
Run this type of election for the mayor or Congress and the New York Times or Le Monde would send reporters and Cuba would send election observers to make a point.
There is a painful but poignant symmetry:
HCSD runs its election the way it runs its classrooms. Extra time on the SAT. The bar lowered.
A district that cannot get students to grade-level numeracy runs a remedial election for an institution with special needs.
A district that misplaced $4 million should not be running the vote that audits it. Who lost the $4m, where is it? More to come.
So where are we now?
Everyone loses.
- Some staff and teachers still lose their jobs.
- Most informed taxpayers resent the cost of a school they no longer trust or can use and the near-empty yellow buses rolling past empty stops.
- Students keep posting bad outcomes, with the rare success rising in spite of the system rather than because of it.
- Welfare Class poverty cycles continue uninterrupted.
Not all employees or their spouses and family members live within the HCSD, so they can't all blindly vote "yes" as you claim.
DeleteMS, that is a strange nitpick. The post focuses on political Capture and electioneering, and you reach for a technicality, unfalsifiable, on residency?
DeleteBut sure... even if half the staff lived outside the area, this is still staff voting on their own audit. And the headcount is even worse. We rechecked: 600 HCSD staff, not 500.
That does not count the ~100 Hudsonians on payroll or volunteering with the 15 youth-services nonprofits whose budgets ride on HCSD's continued failure, or vendors.
The election margin was ~350 votes.
Do the math.
And look, teachers can and should vote. It would just be honorable, honesty, and more fair to have the vote in November... no one has been able to tell us why unions like HTA still lobby against the election date change. Can you?
Unfortunately, HCS, all too true. And big step backward from the days Vince Wallace and I forced NYSED to enforce the law and prevent partisan electioneering by district employees -- and students!!!
DeleteIt's a completely erroneous comment that you started your blathering statement with, and I'm nitpicking? Regarding voting in November. Fiscal year begins April 1, meaning state aid is known when votes take place. Vote in November and you don't know what the state is providing, and if it doesn't pass you are already halfway into the fiscal year. And state law keeps school district operations separated from partisan politics, so you can't just attach the vote to the general election. The state has rules, HCSD can't just do whatever it wants. Maybe look into the state as much as you do HCSD.
DeleteNote that Hudson progressives moved Albany, or moved ahead of the state legislature, on Good Cause Eviction and Rent Control. They cheered Albany defying the federal government on the Green Light Law.
DeleteBut now when more voters might rein in the HCSD/UBI operation... silence.
But interesting point on the trade off between off cycle elections (lower turnout, potentially less national partisanship).
We still prefer the configuration that allows more voters, and no special schemes like having to lose twice, special election day, and not administering your own election and clearly violate your own election laws.
On the darker / brighter side:
ReplyDeleteIn one sense, ironically, this is a great outcome for Kite's Nest, Promise Neighborhood, Friends of Hudson Youth (FOHY), the Youth Center, and every nonprofit whose payroll relies on HCSD's continued failure (the Hudson Welfare Brokers, the MiddleWomen).
They will tell sad stories (often at fancy Galas at Pocketbook) about Hudson's children and use them to build their own institutions and donor rolls. See our list of all 15 nonprofits serving Hudson's 720 youth.
The whole predictable saga is a recruiting trailer for one-party-state municipal failure.
The most damning indictment: the local Democratic committee (which the mayor somehow still sits on?) did not get involved or make any recommendations.
Of course they know how broken this is. They are too captured to stand up for the kids or the taxpayers.
Union Jack is right.
This is how a town gets barbell-ed by the Wealthy Class and the Welfare Class , with the intermediary brokers collecting in the middle.
Over the next two to three years, the Working Middle Class exit continues, one U-Haul at a time. Watch for a small private school or two to open in the area.
They will charge less than HCSD spends per pupil, somehow place graduates at better high schools and colleges, and somehow produce kids who can read, write, and do arithmetic at grade level without bullying each other. In Hudson this is apparently sorcery or magic.
PS. Spare a thought for the good teachers. Many at HCSD are hard-working and selfless.
Many will pay the same rising taxes as the rest of us, knowing the budget passed only because the election was captured and held off cycle. It is the civic equivalent of an unhappy marriage neither spouse can leave for financial or legal reasons, at least until retirement.
~
Imagine what they all know and cannot say out loud.
Everyone at HCSD knows. They fail, they lie to one another about failing, and they then spend the rest of their lives next door to the undeniable evidence.
You mentioned in another post responding to someone that you have been involved in education, in tough districts I believe you said. Why are you not involved at HCSD as a teacher, board member or other? And if taxpayers had not one organizing for them, why not step up? Again, seems like a whole lot of talk on this blog, and very little action. If I am wrong, please enlighten me (briefly).
DeleteCan't speak for others.
Delete3 answers:
You have to be a US citizen to serve on the board. We live in Hudson but are not all citizens or able to run for office / be appointed.
One reformer cannot fix a captured board and school, just like one honest colonel cannot fix Pentagon procurement.
Look at the individual Hudson parents over the last decade who ran, won, served, and promptly hit the machine of obstruction and special interests, and burned out. The gears are the point of the gears.
Also look at how the YES vote camp acted in the face of basic and reasonable argument: doxxing, asking people not to vote, attacking residents and accusing them of "racism", "harm", calling a request for an audit "harassment". Imagine how that camp behaves when reform stops being theoretical.
Re: Taxpayer Organization of some sort.
We could go down that path. HCS is arguably a blog in that direction. Others are thinking about launching a real entity.
But it would perfectly illustrate our "Hudson Handicap" concept facing residents:
Parents are already asked to:
A) pay high HCSD taxes,
B) pay for private school because HCSD does not deliver, especially to kids with unique needs,
C) fund via donations the 15 nonprofits doing the after-school work HCSD does not do and seize city parks at no cost,
D) pay the extra City of Hudson property tax that goes to the Youth Center ($1 in every $5 of City taxes), and now
E) ALSO personally volunteer to fix the institutions failing on A, B, C, and whatever D is supposed to stopgap.
Four payments for one education, and now volunteer with scarce time on top?
That is the Hudson Handicap trade-off in one sentence.
When most rational people face that trade-off, they minimize the pain/waste and focus on higher-leverage life activities. It is rational. They send their kids to private school if they can. They move to functional towns. Once a year they get reminded by HCSD how bad things are, and the rest of the year they are treated as tax cattle.
The issue is not more volunteers or warm bodies.
It is fiscal discipline and student discipline, and neither sticks unless it comes from the top without compromise: board, superintendent, and principals aligned.
Notice how the teachers and the machine churned through three or four superintendents in three years. Maybe one was really bad. Not all four.
And sometimes things are so bad, turnarounds are not possible. They require political will and institutional support. Hudson's political capture and design halts any real reform.
This situation is not new this decade. It is not a bug, it is a feature.
HCSD is more Spirit Airlines than JetBlue. JetBlue is enjoying a turnaround now and will be around for a long time, taking you places.
Spirit was rough, spiraled when a rescue merger was blocked. Eventually died.
Many Hudsonians believe HCSD is past the point of no return.
What do you think?
Correction…
Delete2 sharp-eyed readers note Spirit Airlines is, apparently, cheap; HCSD is not.
The better analogy, these passionate Americans insist, is Sears: expensive, captured, too embedded to fail, untill it wasn’t and filed for bankruptcy.
It was before our time.
We regret the error. The diagnosis stands. Long live Ryanair.
Bravo HCS. You have made -- clearly -- known that the teachers are hard working and the students willing to learn. What's the problem? The adults in charge who won't let the teachers teach and the students learn. It's really pretty simple.
DeleteHCS - that was not brief, and by all accounts JetBlue is in real trouble, having piled up $9 billion in operational debt. But yeah, you know what your'e talking about. LOL
DeleteHave a really funny Teterboro joke to make here but Ms. Bluehawks might find it triggering.
DeleteBut point taken, will avoid aviation analogies until fuel prices stabilize.
~
MS - consider reading this paper:
Dobbie & Fryer 2011, "Are High-Quality Schools Enough to Increase Achievement Among the Poor? Evidence from the Harlem Children's Zone," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics 3(3): 158-187.
Summary here; https://www.povertyactionlab.org/evaluation/high-quality-schools-and-achievement-among-poor-united-states
Turns out things work better when you replace bad teachers and principles, double instructional time, and raise expectations. Not rocket science.
Commenter Bluehawks - is this evidence admissible? Let's run it through the Hudson Identity Hypocrisy filter to see if we can share it:
- He is a man (ignore)
- He is a black man (listen)
- He is from Harvard (ignore)
- He grew up poor (listen)
- He challenges socratically (ignore)
- He disproves progressive priors (ignore)
The (ignores) have it!
Even if his research replicates consistently and helps those who apply it.
Kind of ironic that you can not spell Principal’s correctly.
DeleteFirst, the disclaimers, because I know what a hot bench this space can be. I do not live in Hudson and do not have a dog in this fight. And I certainly believe that educating kids in basic reading and math skills is the most important function a school system provides. I'll even go as far as to say that if a district is failing in this mission, saying no to a proposed budget can be an appropriate way to register disapproval.
ReplyDeleteOK, the comment. After the gallons of digital ink that have been spilled in this blog by HCS and others, words with which I understand the wonderful proprietor to be in basic agreement, I would have expected a more reflective posture today. A little more humility.
This budget passed by 64%. That ain't even close. That only 14% voted is disappointing but very much in line with turnout for school budget votes generally. What I would like to see is a calm, reasoned analysis of why the vote went this way, why the arguments made here and elsewhere at such length failed to persuade. Impugning the voters themselves, as several comments here seem to do, really isn't a good look. Even the owner herself, who has so graciously illuminated us on so many topics over the years, can only muster a "so it goes."
In the days ahead, let's have a clear-eyed post mortem. I'd really like to see people bring their intelligence to bear here, not just their debating skills.
Dear Andrew, you have added a very reasonable retort to a very unreasonable vote. For instance, you fail to recognize the bizarre and politically biased timing of the election itself: school only election, by its nature catering to those who have interests in perpetuating the status quo. Thus, the low turnout is monstrously biased to favor those have an interest in continuing the status quo. What would you consider "a more reflective posture" and why would such a posture require "humility"? These built-in prejudices of the voting timing -- favoring those who have a stake in the status quo -- requires a response to counteract such prejudices; and it ain't your imagined "calm reasoned analysis." You want a "clear-eye post mortem"? You've got it with HCS's analysis.
DeleteThanks AA!
DeleteA 14% off-cycle school board election, run by the School and decided by its own payroll, is like a board voting itself a raise on a Tuesday afternoon, in a room it owns, with HR counting the ballots. The shareholders who could vote it down must show up twice in four weeks, on their own time, while everyone else is paid to be there. The shock would be a no vote. Payroll with a quorum, not democracy. Which is exactly why in 25 years it has been voted down perhaps twice.
This was not a big win. HCSD mirrored standard New York State outcomes. The system favors the unions by design, in most public schools: https://www.hudsoncommonsense.com/riggedschoolvote
Thanks for engaging substantively, and you raise a great point.
Two questions in return for anyone:
1. What is the “inconvenient truth” that “no” voters need to hear?
Make the strongest case we are missing and why it matters for a school and students. Please.
2. What do you think the budget outcome would have been if the vote were held in November alongside the national and local Tuesday elections, with standard ~40- 50% turnout, when Working Middle Class and commuting families have time to participate?
We welcome thoughtful challenge: shared facts different opinions.
P.S. HCS believes that if the vote were held on a non-self-serving day (November), by Mara and the BOE, in a free and fair way (not this DRC vibe of HCSD with missing ballots and electioneering inside the polling station) and a Taxpayer Union leveraged as much $ and volunteers on the election as the teachers union, three things would follow:
1) the budget ask would be instantly pared back by the school board;
2) the taxpayer union would publicly expose the financial engineering by which HCSD smuggled a ~6% increase past the 2% statutory cap; and not get by unchallenged
3) the taxpayer union would win (if this week’s election, budget, and issues, were replayed
Now we will never know this counter factual, because the teachers union rigged the game and continue to oppose reform re Election Day, and nearly half of the voters who showed up are on its literal payroll.
And to that end, no teacher, administrator or parent have been able to answer why the election is off cycle, and why said off cycle election with a typical 10% participation is democratic, honorable, or serving the greater good.
We live in a state and county that does not require government issued ID at the polling station to.vote to “increase access” (but you need a government issued ID to enter the school building if not a student and the County admin office) but no one thought to increase access by… moving the vote to the day when everyone votes.
pure ideology, as always, from
Deletethe slop machine
“teachers union rigged the game ..and nearly half of the voters who showed up are on its literal payroll.”
Hi DM -
DeleteIf a classical liberal and coherent worldview applied consistently to Hudson counts as ideology, we plead guilty.
The math in your sentence: 600 HCSD staff, plus families, plus ~100 from the 15 allied nonprofits, against a 376-vote margin in a 14% turnout election the district ran itself.
Also see the footnotes here, many sourced IRL; https://www.hudsoncommonsense.com/frenemiesofyouth
Where do you think the missing $4m went? Can the school claw it back?
its incoherent, as the last class you speak for is the working middle; and its applied wildly inconsistently, see the public spends never spoken of.
Deleteits high volume, low quality discourse, fashioned in a vaguely tech libertarian vein, the now standard approach for elite capture.
I have one comment to make and don’t plan to follow up on this after writing:
ReplyDeleteThe budget passed because tax paying parents in this district wanted it to. We don’t want to live in a district where we see our teachers and administrators bagging groceries on weekends while our kids enjoy the sunshine. Those same teachers and administrators who volunteer at events around our community and attend our kids sporting events and art shows, cheering them on by our side. We want to continue to see our sports, ESL, art and music programs grow, all while keeping our voices heard about less screens and more nature in our classrooms. We want to continue to see a small student to teacher ratio, because that means our kids can continue to learn to read in small groups, as opposed to a one size fits all method.
Every parent who voted for this budget probably shares some of the same concerns as posters here. The difference is, we have hope that our continued support and oversight of our school district will lead to more positive growth for our students in the future. If that also means lower taxes in the future? Great.
What I see on this blog is a weird obsession with the children who attend HCSD. Frankly, the amount of men posting regularly about what our kids may or may not be worthy of or capable of, their ability to read, and the majority women who educate them is creepy and odd. Want to make a real impact on a child’s life? Volunteer to be a lunch time reading buddy. This is a program that kids at MC Smith love, bolsters intergenerational relationships, and supports both struggling and advanced readers. But to be honest, after reading these comments, I wouldn’t want anyone here within fifty feet of my kid.
The inability of any of these commenters to actually accomplish any positive impact on our community, alongside their inability to write concise statements, would have them laughed out of a PTA meeting.
You’ve accomplished nothing, created no hope, and are now known around town as the guy who verbally harassed a local special ed teacher in front of her neighbors at the farmer’s market (and the weird guys who think that’s ok). Parents volunteered and increased voter turnout because of your treatment of our educators.
A final note for any of the other commenters here who don’t have children at HCSD: you won’t see mothers regularly debating the warped data being spread by men whose children don’t attend our schools because we simply don’t have the time. We are actually using our skills to improve our schools day by day. We don’t need to send out a press release about what that means because the people that see and feel the work are our children. Men punching down on the women and children of this community need to start looking to their left and right. Find a target above your weight class, stand up from your chair, and actually do something. But you won’t, because you don’t actually care that much.
Also, why not just open up comments on your own site? Instead of basically turning Gossips into an aggregator of your content? You are a transplant capitalizing on the hard work of a woman who’s been doing it longer in order to raise your profile. If you want to force your readers to write op eds instead of leaving comments, could you stop crowding this site with your agenda? Gossips is losing readers because the constant badgering between disillusioned men is too triggering to risk being exposed to.
Now I have to go because I have a 9-5, library books to return, and a school concert to attend later today. Enjoy looking down upon the happy children of Hudson this weekend from your perch on Warren Street. You and your cohort are giving us all the ick.
- Written by a life long Upstate NYer, Bluehawk parent, homeowner, and employee of a local small business. Not including my name because I don’t need HCS stalking me online
A comment that spends 700 ad hominem words on who the critics, and not one on whether they are right, or what the right question is, and how the Working Middle Class is harmed by HCSD, is not above the fray.
DeleteIt is the fray. Welcome.
And a teacher (whether Special Ed, Maths, a Coach, or College Counsellor) who puts themselves in a public space with election materials, and proactively engages passing taxpayers... and cannot answer basic questions about school outcomes, egregiously misstates well documented national trends on Charter Schools, repeats HCSD budget falsehoods (not out of malice, just lack of knowledge) and experiences a socratic conversation as harassment is, since you keep raising gender, Ma'am, the textbook specimen of the white progressive female reflex that treats any inquiry, anything other than affirmation, any insistence on higher standards, as "violence."
That is one of the reasons why HCSD is where it is.
Also, did they ever say who lost the $4m and what new system has been implemented to avoid it in the future?
But you are right in one respect, and AA's question is such a good one:
861 to 485 votes, on a Tuesday in May, by Albany's design, and only one side campaigning. 15% of voters have spoken.
~
But the following numbers still do not make sense:
- $42k per year per kid.
- 918th out of 1,008 NY school districts.
Peter Meyer, who sat on the Hudson school board, said it best: the voters of HCSD will get the district they deserve.
Oh, Bluehawks, just saw your comment that you want to comment on HCS. We welcome Letters to the Editors and publish them.
Deletewrite.12534.org
We encourage more long-form (as you can tell), Gossips is more short commentary below the story. As norm we fail too often, which we will admit.
English as a second language is hard ;-)
THANK YOU! could not agree more with this comment. It’s exhausting scrolling past the HCS comments.
DeleteAl -
DeleteNoted on brevity wrt Gossips.
But as Helen Suzman, the great liberty crusader said:
"It is not my questions that embarrass Hudson, it is Hudson's answers."
Let it be known. I will not be publishing any more comments on this post. To quote Stanley Hudson, "Everybody's spoken their mind, and no one's changing their mind."
ReplyDelete